Hey guys,
With the new year it is time we give you another update on the game, where we are development-wise, and how things are set to go forward this year.
On Budgets and Publishers
As you may recall, shortly after our Kickstarter finished, we signed up with publisher Camlann Games to handle the marketing and distribution for the game. After our Unity-related issues they also offered to fund the Godot port, which eventually extended into a larger deal to finance a more extensive Early Access release and additional team members to help speed things along.
With the new budget agreed on, we drafted up a timeline, hired new team members and soon got to work. While the new team members were a major boost to productivity, things unfortunately didn't last very long. Soon after we began work on the Godot port, Camlann ran into severe financial troubles. It started with missed or severely delayed payments. After a while they defaulted on us entirely, forcing us to let off all the new hires, while Ricky and I spent several months essentially working without any income.
While they did eventually sort out their finances and clear their debts with us, the second round didn't last very long either, and they defaulted again back in October. We were forced to terminate our publishing agreement and strike out on our own again. The good news is, while the split did throw things into disarray for a while, we managed to secure an independent source of funding that'll cover our remaining development costs.
State of Development
Internally, things have been very chaotic with constant budget fluctuations and team members being hired only to be laid off a few weeks later. Nonetheless we finished porting our game engine to Godot, along with a number of critical features. A lot of time went into the underlying engine itself and making sure the architecture was sound and stable, so as to avoid a repeat DOTS scenario. While many features are still pending, we finished the frameworks necessary to implement most of them, so we should be able to move forward relatively quickly from here.
Our initial focus was on getting the base building and management aspect up and running, with features like character customization, construction and storage successfully completed. Farming and crafting are in their end stages. With the home base gameplay done, we'll be free to move on to combat systems and exploration. You can expect more details on those soon.
Roadmap Implications
Our new budget not only comes upfront (so no risk of business partners suddenly defaulting on us again), but at very favorable conditions. However, it is also significantly lower than the budget Camlann originally promised us and for which our official roadmap was created. While we still have enough funds to get the most important features done, some things will have to be cut back. This includes mostly visual improvements we had planned to make before release, such as environmental weather, improved outlines, etc. Other features will be in the release, but in a reduced fashion.
This does not mean those features are gone forever, but they will need to be implemented as part of future updates. For the Early Access release we will focus on having the basic gameplay loop of building and managing a home base, sending out expeditions and fighting enemies in tactical combat up and running. Our goal is to implement the basics and polish them into a release-ready state, then flesh them out during Early Access.
One major implication for our international audience concerns localization: Camlann was handling all matters surrounding translating the game, and we don't have the means to fund proper translations ourselves. As such, the Early Access release won't feature any official translations, though they may follow in the future.
To make up for the cuts, we're planning to release the initial Early Access version at a discounted price. As the game comes closer to completion, the discount will decrease until the game reaches its full price near 1.0. We think this will give early adopters a fairer deal, as they may not have a fully fleshed out release but can save a good bit on the final price in return.
Upcoming Content
As many of you noticed, things have been quiet on the dev log and around the game for a while. Camlann was originally handling the promotion of the game to the wider world, but once their financial troubles started most of their staff had to be laid off. As a result, marketing efforts on their part came to a screeching halt. We also had a lot of issues around schedules for blog posts, videos and so on being announced, only to be cancelled immediately after. Given the chaotic internal situation, any kind of schedules proved near impossible to keep, and we eventually decided to limit ourselves to small-scale posts like the dev leaks we regularly post to our Discord community.
With our publishing agreement terminated, we're back in charge of our own PR. Leading up to the release we want to pick up the pace again and release some feature highlights and videos to showcase the game and its mechanics. It is important to us that players buying the Early Access release know what they are and aren't getting, that is a game in development with a vision for something greater in the future. While we are just as hyped as you to see the final game, it is important to understand that there is still a long road ahead of us and players who just want a finished product may want to wait until after a few updates are out at least.
That's it for today. Until next time, stay safe and keep surviving!